(Pretzels because he had helped me make chocolate covered pretzels on Thanksgiving- aww melts my heart that he remembers that!)

I didn't object. I love having my little binker nephew over and LOVE that he likes spending time over my house!

My sister and I went a little overboard with the cookie making. (We made about six different kinds) And tell me why we were sooo over it, after the fist batch was done- ha!

We are not bakers, or cookers....I guess we get it from our Mama who really doesn't like cooking/baking either.

But we stuck it out and made all the cookies. It was an ALL day event. Travis was alseep on the couch by the end of it.

Lets be honest, Travis just liked decorating/eating the sugar cookies!

You HAVE to have a major sweet tooth to eat these bad boys!

I don't know when I deemed this awkward bun on top of my head appropriate. I feel like this is what happens when making cookies with a 2 1/2- year-old. Be prepared, hubs, for many awkward hairdo's when I'm a Mommy.

Baking with Travis and my sister was so fun! It def. is a new tradition!! Love having them four doors down from me! :-)

During our "lunch break" from baking my sister and I made Travis go outback and let us take pictures of him!

Tell me why, it was 60 degrees in Baltimore Thursday- on the first day of winter! In the words of Travis, "What the??"

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Friday I spent the evening with my sister, my nephew, my sister’s best friend and her son.

It was a total Essex/Dundalk night.

We ate dinner at Baltimore’s famous Pizza John’s, where we enjoyed some greasy-good pizza and an abundance of soda.

My sister’s best friend, Traci, somehow managed to accidentally steal a whole pitcher of soda and four cups. And then on top of that, she got her original order of an apple juice and medium soda. And my sister and I already had our two drinks. We were really giggly about it and then had to pee a lot during the night because of all the soda consumption.

After dinner, we took my nephew, Travis, and Traci’s son, Brennan, to the train garden at the local fire station.

Brennan and Travis in pure amazement!!

Yes, those are the golden eggs AKA the Poop Factory. I don't know why or who made those but made me laugh outloud. Only in Dundalk...

It was really crowded but def. worth the wait since the boys were all about the trains. The train set-up was awesome! I can’t even imagine how long it took them to set all of those trains and the villages/towns up.

Saturday Matt and I worked on the house some, did some last minute Christmas shopping and spent some quality time together.

Even though money is tight, we treated ourselves to Panera Bread for lunch. You know your newlyweds/ new homeowners when Panera Bread is a real “treat.”

But I ain’t gonna lie, I love me some Panera Bread so I was happy to go with the hubs and spend the day with him! We’ve been so busy with the house that we haven’t spent a lot of time together. It was def. nice to eat, shop and laugh together!

It was as nice weekend and went way too fast, like they always do.

Here are some photos I took with my new camera of my nephew, Travis, Friday night!

My sister and her best friend- I don't know why my sister is laughing so hard, but I love it!

PS. I am so excited and ready for all the Christmas festivities to begin!

Did I mention, Santa came to visit our neighborhood last week on the fire truck?! I look forward to seeing him every year!

Sorry about the not so great pictures, I'm still learning how to use this new fancy camera. Any tips?

Pss. T-Minus (after today) 1 more day of work! Yay! Then 5 days of baking, cleaning, celebrating, drinking, laughing and gift exchanging!